Geno Smith Thinks He'll Be A Top Five QB, Sources Confirm He's Delusional

Note: The author of this post is a New York Jets fan and doesn’t like Geno Smith and thinks Michael Vick anyone not named Geno Smith should be the starting quarterback this season. Keep that in mind while reading this admittedly biased post.

Because there’s no way of avoiding the topic, I’m going to start this post the same way that ESPN’s New York Jets beat writer Rich Cimini did. I’m going to tell you that Geno Smith was recently rated the worst quarterback in the NFL in an ESPN survey of 26 league insiders (eight general managers, two former GMs, four pro personnel evaluators, seven coordinators, two position coaches, and a top executive).

The survey asked the participants to rate each quarterback in the league on a scale of 1-5, with 1 being the best and 5 being the worst. Geno Smith averaged a 4.48. That same player told Cimini today after practice that he thinks he’ll be a top five quarterback in a year or two.

“The thing about it is, you have to climb up,” Smith told ESPN.com on Saturday after practice. “If I’m No. 32, by this time next year or the year after, I expect to be in the top 5.”

“My first reaction was, ‘You know, man, I’ve got to prove them wrong,’ ” Smith said. “In the end, none of that matters. My key job is to make sure this team is improving and I’m doing everything I can for the betterment of this team.”

I know, man. And I understand that all professional athletes are encouraged to carry some confidence both on and off the field. If you don’t believe you can be a top five quarterback, you can’t become a top five quarterback.

Smith entered the NFL with about as much college experience as you can get out of a quarterback. He was West Virginia’s starter for three seasons, taking the helm of the Mountaineers squad for 39 games. He completed nearly 1,000 passes (988) in his college career along with 11,662 yards, 98 touchdowns, and just 21 interceptions. He completed 67.4 percent of his pass attempts, hitting a high of 71.2 percent in his senior year.

Of course, no quarterback is going to immediately tear up the competition in the NFL in his rookie season. But Smith dropped to the second round, where the Jets drafted him at 39. There’s a reason that the Chiefs, Jaguars, Raiders, Eagles, and Bills all passed up on Smith after expressing interest in drafting him early in the first round. That says something. When a guy with numbers like his drops that far in a draft full of teams that need passers, it’s a red flag.

In his first season with the Jets, Smith started all 16 games, completed 55.8 percent of his passes for 3,046 yards, 12 touchdowns, 21 interceptions, and four fumbles lost (25 turnovers). That’s abysmal. That’s only slightly better than Mark Sanchez’s rookie season. and Sanchez only started 16 games in college before being thrust into the big leagues.

Most of this doesn’t really mean anything and Smith can turn it around and improve. But I’m going to stick with saying that he’s out of his mind and will never even come close to being a top five quarterback, let alone crack the top 30.